How far do I actually push myself? My ego wants me to believe that I leave it all out there everyday, but I know that's not true. Let me side track here for a second, if you ever have the option to do a competitive martial art, do it. It is in my opinion the best way to learn how to take your ego out of the equation and really get to know what you are capable of, after you've been beaten senseless by a lady who is 30 years older than you, and you we're basically defenseless because she was so skilled and practiced, you learn a lot about being humble and finding out your weaknesses. Ok, back on track. I know me pretty well, when I am working out my ego is in the drivers seat and it loves to lie to me and let me know how hard I am pushing, but when I analyze my workouts after I know when I am dogging it, when I am bailing 5-10 reps early, splitting sets when I should push through ect... We all do it, we all give in before we have to, and what is so frustrating to me about this is that I am wasting time. If I pushed all the way every time I could get stronger fast. I could push my endurance further, I could get closer to who I want to be faster.
So why? When you are mid workout, when you are deep in the hole of suck and you hit that wall, you put the bar down, you drop the ball, you break the set, you know that you've gone as far as you can and need a minute to recoup... but do you? I can tell myself those lies right up until I am working out with anyone else, particularly my brother in laws or at my gyms (Levels) Sunday group workouts. I am a very competitive person. I said it, I like to lie about it, but I want to win, at everything, and not by a little. I want to win, and I want to win by such a wide margin it's stupid. I think it comes from losing a lot. I had the benefit of my first year of little league being on one of the worst teams in the city. It taught me how to lose, it taught me to want to win. So losing doesn't really make me mad, it lights a fire in me. I want to ferret out my weaknesses, I want to find other people strengths and make them my strength. It's pathological. If i'm honest it's a problem, but anyway. I started thinking about how I am working out in this bubble. I don't have anyone I work against (except my past performances), and I thought to myself, oh crap, I'm a quitter.
A short existential crisis later, and now I am trying to figure out how to right that ship. How in this training vacuum am I going to perform at my best? So I decided to look at what is it that stops me, and that's when it occurred to me that I have been building all those "walls" I hit. I have been laying the foundation and placing all the bricks for all those points where I tell myself "this is where you need to stop".
I lay the foundation for those walls well in advance of hitting them. I refuse to rehab my shoulder and knee, I lean on my ankle injury rather than figuring out how to fix it. Tonight during the Levels group workout they decided to run 2.4ish miles rather than 1.5 and I was bummed, and about half way in my knee and ankle we're starting to get sore, not the sore that is indicative of injury, but the kind of sore that says "you're taxing these muscle more than you have in a long time and it hurts" and I actually found myself hitting my knee and ankle harder than I should, leaning into the injury and thinking "if you have to stop it makes sense because you're recovering".Well this whole 40% thing is fresh in my mind so I decide that, that's crap and focus on balancing my stride, striking right with my feet, and while I am certainly not going to lead a run I didn't break. It sucked, it hurt, it was not fun, but I didn't break, and I know if I was alone tonight I would have, and that makes me so mad.
See here's the thing. I knew I had an injury, I know logically I am a lot healthier than I was weeks ago because of all the rehab work I have been doing, but I have been whispering in my own ear about my ankle and my knee for weeks. I have been building that wall just so I could run into it. Not a wall my body put up that says "if you go one more step like this you'll be injured" but a wall of justification for giving up. I've done the same thing with my shoulders. Rather than putting in the rehab time to make that weakness my strength, I leave that injury alone, because it's an easy one for me to lean on and give in early, and everyone get's why I stop, and everyone knows how smart I am for listening to my body, because I've laid the groundwork for that lie.
Now I don't think I am going to fix this is week, a month, maybe not a year. My gym isn't a competitive bro gym, and I love it for that reason, but not having someone to push against and they intern push you lets me off the hook. I know every time I put the bar down, or give up on a session on the rower, or sit down on the bike I am going to ask myself "really? is that all? did you give everything?" and I am going to answer that honestly.
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